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A lot of Americans support these attacks on universities. Why do people harbour this much animosity towards these institutions? Is there anything they could hav

A lot of Americans support these attacks on universities. Why do people harbour this much animosity towards these institutions? Is there anything they could have done differently in the past decade or two to have broader sympathy now, or is people's ambivalence towards elite universities 100% irrational?

pjc50 2y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings was arguably a worse time for universities. Protesting attracts reprisals. Universities taught people, both explicitly and by example, to stand up for what they believed in, but have undersold students on how dangerous that is. Universities could have done a better job explaining that certain injustices are load-bearing, and that calling them out will make half the country hate you.
- LatteLazy 2y ago
  > certain injustices are load-bearing This is an excellent way of explaining why some injustices are ignored and others decried. Thank you
- matthewdgreen 2y ago
  People in the 1960s were murdered for protesting. You might imagine that this motivated an end to protest, and everyone calmed down. But in fact, it didn't. The very best way to motivate increased protest is to act like a bunch of monsters.
drooby 2y ago
I think it's actually extremely simple.. because the herd mentality is extremely simple. Intellectuals think it's complex because intellectuals love complexity.. This is what happened.. The right witnessed riots over the past decade. These riots were in response to police brutality and perceived racism. The ideas behind anti-racism spawned a perceived new ideology - "wokism". This frightened the right. Intellectuals on the right mapped the origins of this new ideology to philosophies from elite institutions. Therefore, these institutions must be punished to be kept in check. It's really that simple.. What I find interesting about this guy is that in a way he actually is "caving" to the demands of the administration. This uni president advocates for more heterodox thinking - which is in alignment with what the Trump admin wants as well... maybe that's why Wesleyan won't be punished..
- krapp 2y ago
  Nothing about this is new - the right has harbored a particular hatred for "academics" and "intellectuals" since at least the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960s. Today's fear of "wokism" is just the prior generation's fear of "cultural marxism" with a new coat of paint. But this kind of political talk is against the guidelines. Good hackers don't care about any of this. So Javascript is getting crazy, huh?
  - e40 2y ago
    When the politics get crazy enough it bleeds into everything, which is why it's now acceptable to discuss here.
    - krapp 2y ago
      I think you'll find that no matter how crazy it gets or what it bleeds into, it's never going to be acceptable to discuss here. As soon as people get a whiff of "politics" they're going to start flagging. Especially if they see the "T" word. The regime could be rolling dissidents into mass graves and the only valid point of discussion for most people here would be packing algorithms.
      - andelink 2y ago
        Forgive my ignorance, but what is the "T" word in this context?
        Smithalicious 2y ago
        Tigger
        selimthegrim 2y ago
        Oh no Pooh, you’re eating liberalism!
        2y ago
ty6853 2y ago
Most people don't care about university protests. They're largely a means to get laid while achieving nothing and at worst destroying their own university. As long as they don't spill out into the surrounding town any outrage is essentially theater.
lr4444lr 2y ago
There are some reasons that I think you probably know, which don't receive enough time and attention 1) Despite an appearance of being "left leaning" (according to polls of faculty political sentiment) they continue to gatekeep education behind prohibitively expensive tuition that is out of reach of lower economic strata without crippling debt, and have simultaneously struggled to produce graduates whose economic differential easily makes up for that expense and lost work time. 2) They enjoy a tax free status while receiving significant tax money despite many failing to grow their student bodies in tandem with the growth of the US population, leading to people questioning whether they deserve those benefits as institutions that serve the public. 3) There is a sentiment that basic literacy and numeracy of graduates has dropped over the last decades outside of a narrow area of studies, because of a shift to a model where students are customers buying a credential instead of getting an education. (These are all interrelated, of course.)
- insane_dreamer 2y ago
  > many failing to grow their student bodies in tandem with the growth of the US population this is mostly true of elite schools (who nowadays are mostly selling a brand more than an education), not so much of state schools
  - chrisweekly 2y ago
    Ironically, many elite universities are actually either free or nearly free, for lower-income students. The super-rich probably don't care. While we middle-class families don't qualify for need-based aid, and are on the hook to pay outrageous sums, largely to subsidize the aid for others.
- kjkjadksj 2y ago
  Lower economic strata doesn't take on debt, they get aid and free rides, cherry work study jobs to put some money in the pocket too. It is the middle class or upper middle class that insists in eschewing their state school benefit for a more or less comparable school in another state (or without favorable scholarship and aid package) that take the brunt of the loans.
_bohm 2y ago
While not about resentment towards universities specifically, I thought this article in The Baffler [1] did a good job of framing a dynamic that, I think, contributes to this phenomenon. My interpretation: As the country has entered the post-industrial era, holding a college degree has increasingly become a table-stakes credential for entering the white collar labor force. The higher education system has struggled or failed to grow to meet increased demand for these credentials, which both drives up the cost and increases selectivity of higher-ed institutions. A lot of people get burned by this and become locked out of and, crucially, geographically separated from labor markets that now constitute the majority of US GDP. This split causes non degree holders to view degree holders as their class enemies, and the universities as the class gateway that divides them. [1] https://thebaffler.com/latest/one-elite-two-elites-red-elite-blue-elite-baker https://thebaffler.com/latest/one-elite-two-elites-red-elite...
- keybored 2y ago
  Remember all those people who are resentful (of course that word) towards degree-holders because they wish they had one themselves? Me neither. That’s a they-hate-me-cause’-they-ain’t-me kind of logic.[1] True othering comes from people living in different worlds and hating the other person’s world. [1] I did not read the the article but I’ve read this argument in a Graeber article.
  - bobthepanda 2y ago
    > because they wish they had one themselves I don't think the OP actually said this specifically. But the economy truly had, for a while, bifurcated in outcomes for people with degrees vs. everybody else. You shouldn't need a degree to live a decent life, but now we are in a timeline where you can put DoorDash on Klarna installments.
  - Izikiel43 2y ago
    > Remember all those people who are resentful (of course that word) towards degree-holders because they wish they had one themselves? I think the fair comparison isn't they have a degree and I don't, it's they have a better life/savings/house/car than me, which is enabled in general by getting a degree, which becomes the common contention point.
bell-cot 2y ago
There's a highly emotional Right-Left culture war going on in America. Many of our "flagship" universities conspicuously sided with the Left - at least on most of the "litmus test" issues. And where universities didn't do that, the Right found it advantageous to talk up the association & outrage anyway. Any decent History Prof. could have explained to the U's that openly taking one side in long-term cultural wars was not a viable long-term strategy. (Or, maybe that's why so many universities cut their History Dept's so brutally? Though "just shoot inconvenient messengers" is also not a viable long-term strategy.)
- mrtesthah 2y ago
  Billionaires shifted the overton window by pouring money into extreme right-wing media outlets and social media platforms. Every other existing institution now appears "left-wing" by comparison. That's not universities' fault.
  - lmm 2y ago
    Not true, at least on social issues, which is what the universities are getting burned for. Policy positions that were mainstream in 2000 are now painted as far-right.
    - jhbadger 2y ago
      That's how society progresses though. Before 1865, slavery was mainstream and abolitionists were weird radical crazies. Before 1965, "Jim Crow" laws that said non-whites had to use different bathrooms and drinking fountains were mainstream, and people who opposed them were seen as unreasonable.
      - lmm 2y ago
        And back in the 1960s a planned economy was normal and reasonable, and many progressives openly called for normalisation of sex with teenagers. Sometimes shifts in attitudes are progress. Sometimes they're just a random walk. Sometimes the left is right, sometimes the right is.
disambiguation 2y ago
The political and ideological divide speaks for itself, but on behalf of the common folk universities have been failing their core mission - to provide the people with a quality education. The inversion and disconnect between the cost of tuition and economic outcomes is stunning. Too many kids who don't know better are pressured into pursuing higher education and taking on massive debt, only to graduate without any job prospects or reasonable hopes of paying off their loans. The salt in the wounds is that universities are flush with cash, yet its spent on anything and everything except for the welfare of the students.
- harimau777 2y ago
  It feels to me like part of the disconnect is that education and job training isn't necessarily the same thing. For many majors improving economic outcomes is not the core mission.
  - disambiguation 2y ago
    Its an implicit promise, and we can already see the pendulum swinging back in the form of lower enrollment as more people catch on.
    - lurk2 2y ago
      > Its an implicit promise It's an inferred promise, not an implicit promise. Lots of schools do try to make it an explicit, qualified promise (e.g. "80% of grads work in their field!"), and even more are shifting towards becoming what are effectively vocational schools, but this was never the intended purpose of a liberal arts education.
- jwjohnson314 2y ago
  > The salt in the wounds is that universities are flush with cash, yet its spent on anything and everything except for the welfare of the students. Maybe the elites. State schools and small colleges are not flush with cash and many have been shuttered or severely downsized recently. Though they could still spend their limited funds better.
dogleash 2y ago
>or is people's ambivalence towards elite universities 100% irrational? am·biv·a·lence /amˈbiv(ə)ləns/ noun the state of having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone. Ambivalence seems like a rational take on post-secondary education in the US. I'd say an unwavering opinion (positive or negative) would be irrational. It's such a complex beast that serves so many roles and touches so many lives. >A lot of Americans support these attacks on universities. Why do people harbour this much animosity towards these institutions? There are a lot of very real things that are rotten in academia if you exclude the social politics center to this article. So when people see they're loosing federal funding... yeah, some will think along the lines of "eh, whatever, fuck 'em, maybe they'll figure out how to clean their own house." Especially if the university is also known for both sitting on a large endowment and for prioritizing self-serving administrators over doing academics.
Gothmog69 2y ago
They could have not been so partisan (https://readlion.com/93-of-college-profs-political-donations-went-to-democrats-last-election-cycle/ https://readlion.com/93-of-college-profs-political-donations... ), supported rational discourse ( https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/2025-college-free-speech-rankings#:~:text=The%20University%20of%20Virginia%20is,second%20year%20in%20a%20row. https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/2025-college-free-spe... ) , not used race to discriminate on certain out groups ( https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discrimination-on-admissions/ https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio... ). Just for starters
- fn-mote 2y ago
  >> Is there anything they could have done differently in the past decade or two to have broader sympathy now > not used race to discriminate on certain out groups ( https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio... ) Since we have documentation of discrimination in university admissions for over a century, I don't think this particular issue produces "broader sympathy now". In fact, I will be speechless if I ever learn the new administration policies do not lead to even higher levels of, but I suppose different, discrimination. Check back in 6 months.
recursive 2y ago
Provide a way to get a lower-cost credential without using the tuition to subsidize research/athletics/arts/social programs. But that might be counter to their whole nature. Doesn't mean anyone's being irrational though. They're now de-facto gatekeepers on entering the professional class. I don't think it's unreasonable for the gate-kept to have opinions about the -keepers.
- treis 2y ago
  I've got the ticket to get in the gate and I'm pretty resentful of having to get it. Looking back there were a lot better ways to spend 4 years and 100k.
  - joe5150 2y ago
    Resentful of what? Directed at whom? There are lots of options that cost less and many are shorter than four years.
- xracy 2y ago
  Honestly, it feels like the kind of thing that companies which actually want merit-based graduates should want to subsidize more aggressively. If you're a billion-dollar company that only hires college grads, it feels like there's gotta be value to you in making sure there's more meritocracy in the process of getting degrees. It would also change who the customer is so that the university doesn't "owe" the student a degree which makes the evaluation that universities do a little less rigorous.
  - eszed 2y ago
    Why do they want meritocracy? The companies I've seen up close want "certified Smart Kid", in which case nearly any degree will do; "pre-trained worker", in which case they require a degree in a particular field; or "someone well-connected", in which case they want someone from a limited set of schools. (Companies do subsidize that limited set of schools, and pretty heavily, but it probably has more to do with social connections than economic merit.) The system might break down to the point that what you're suggesting makes sense. On the other hand, "Indebted Worker" (from any of the three types above) allows companies a lot of power over their employees, so it might not.
guywithahat 2y ago
> attacks on universities This really feels like bad phrasing, when people read that they roll their eyes. Basically every major republican politician went to college, nobody is attacking universities, they're trying to help the students.
- watwut 2y ago
  Yes they went to universities. No, they are not trying to help the students. They don't even pretend to be trying to do so. They are nit trying to make it cheaper and they are not trying to make it more accessible. They agenda was either openly the opposite or they ignored the students. Except when they think they are too progressive and attack then verbally.
  - guywithahat 2y ago
    I mean, at a minimum, they think they're helping students. Nobody would vote for a politician who just makes things worse, that doesn't make sense. In this case, they're trying to make universities more fair and to reduce government waste in universities by removing DEI programs. There's lots of logic to that.
    - Izikiel43 2y ago
      >Nobody would vote for a politician who just makes things worse Why not? One thing is the campaign, another one is exercising his power. To quote a famous Argentinian President: "If I said what I would do, they wouldn't have voted for me".
      - guywithahat 2y ago
        I can't find the source of that quote (possibly a misquote?), but if I had to guess, he's saying he sold people on the problem, knowing they wouldn't like the solution. Everyone likes the idea of fixing the budget deficit, and some people like the idea of cutting wasteful government spending, but the act of fixing the budget means people lose jobs, and lives are destroyed. Even though it has to happen, people don't like watching it happen. I don't think your "quote" says what you think it says.
chrisweekly 2y ago
I think there's class warfare practically baked in with how paying for college works today. Imagine trying to determine how much a fancy car costs, and being told "it depends on how much money you have". That's on the upper-middle-class side. The other side is just part of the worldview of the rampant anti-intellectualism which Trump rode to power.
taeric 2y ago
Hard not to see this as a class war that has been fed by some of the personalities that were big in the "conservative" sphere for a long time. Modern podcast influencers are big, but this isn't exactly a new thing. Rush and his ilk were big on lashing out against "ivory tower" theories. And they didn't invent the idea. Just went after easy targets. None of which is to say that mistakes weren't made in the institutions. They were. Mistakes were also made by the critics. Populism, sadly, has a habit of celebrating their worst and elevating them to heights they flat out can't handle.
2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
Fox News. I don't think it's 100% irrational but perhaps 99% irrational. These ideas usually contain a nugget of truth.
rayiner 2y ago
It was the progressive push of theoretically neutral institutions taking stands on moral politics. People who were fine with universities being staffed with liberals, but neutral in practice, realized their tax dollars were subsidizing institutions that were actively taking a side in national politics. For example, universities burned a lot of political capital, and opened themselves up to a great deal of legal liability, with aggressively pursing affirmative action policies. When you depend on public grants, it’s probably a bad idea to publicly discriminate against the racial group that comprises the majority of taxpayers. As to what universities should have done, the answer is “just dribble.” Universities should be places that are just as eager to research effective approaches to mass deportations as all the DEI stuff they do.
- archagon 2y ago
  Sure, and why not open an Institute of Enhanced Interrogation Studies while you’re at it? Ugh.
  - milesrout 2y ago
    Because torturing people is illegal and contrary to our fundamental values, while deporting illegal immigrants is a very popular and sensible policy that is uncontroversial everywhere except the United States of Exceptionalism.
    - archagon 2y ago
      Torturing people was considered very cool and very legal until quite recently. Some of the leaders involved in Iraq and Afghanistan era torture are still in positions of power. And I would not be shocked in the slightest if it came back under Trump II.
- hausrat 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - milesrout 2y ago
WalterBright 2y ago
They could try hiring some conservative professors. https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/31/2/homogenous_the_political_affiliations_of_elite_liberal_arts_college_faculty https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/31/2/homogenous_the_p...
- zdragnar 2y ago
  You can't really just hire some, though. You need to hire enough so that they don't get run out of the school for thought crime https://www.thedoe.com/article/conservative-college-professor-makes-me-toxic https://www.thedoe.com/article/conservative-college-professo...
  - xracy 2y ago
    https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/id1651876897?i=1000603422829 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-am... A lot of these examples have been pretty thoroughly debunked as either non-existent, or about something other than the professors expressing "conservative views". This one is, I assume intentionally, anonymized and so we can't actually verify that it happened or what the circumstances around it were. But I'll call out one of the most common "views" I've heard on college campuses from professors that got in trouble for something was that "professors should be allowed to sleep with their students." So if professors are taking heat for thinking that they should be able to take advantage of barely legal kids... I don't really care. If there are legitimate examples of professors just expressing that they have conservative beliefs, then that is suspicious because school administrators and alumni tend to lean pretty conservative themselves, and often make the final decisions on such issues after a frustrating amount of investigation.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
karaterobot 2y ago
You're framing this in an odd way if you want neutral responses. Is withdrawing federal funding an attack? The government has always used the power of the purse as a lever to influence many institutions, including universities, and it often uses this mechanism to exert influence for ideological purposes. The most famous example is withholding funding for roads until states mandated a drinking age of 21. It's how the federal-state power asymmetry works. The disturbing thing is that Congress isn't really the one exerting it in this case, not that it's being used at all.
- lr4444lr 2y ago
  As for the roads example, which would go to my second point if I understand you correctly, I think the analogy is limited: roads aren't gate-kept by admissions committees for certain intangible criteria for who can ride on them, with an artificial limit on how many cars overall, while they receive federal funding. If that was happening, then you'd have a similar situation to what universities are doing.
  - karaterobot 2y ago
    It's not meant as an analogy for this case, so don't worry about it too much. My only point in bringing it up is an example of evidence for prior governments being more than willing to use funding as a lever to influence the policy of institutions they are not directly responsible for. I don't believe it was to be 1:1 to make that point, as indeed it is not.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
energy123 2y ago
It's about reclaiming lost social status. In their minds it's part of the liberal gollum that makes them feel alienated from society and disrespected.
tastyface 2y ago
Why did the Germans burn books? Look there for your answers. And I mean that sincerely. There’s really nothing new under the sun.
- ytpete 2y ago
  Or the Cultural Revolution.
Sloowms 2y ago
Wait, there are attacks on universities? Or are we just using that word for any expression of free speech?
- sequoia 2y ago
  I'm referring to threats to pull hundreds of thousands of dollars of funding if certain demands aren't met. But yes, there are also plenty of rhetorical attacks.
  - xvokcarts 2y ago
    Isn't that how funding works? We give you money, you meet demands. How is that an attack?
    - sequoia 1y ago
      Yeah fair enough. I agree Trump was elected democratically and he's acting on behalf of "the people" when he threatens to pull funding. Perhaps attack was the wrong word.
tomrod 2y ago
From what I've been able to gather, a mix of jealousy for not being involved with institutions along with some form of Dunning Kruger effect thinking that the institutions have no merit or value (i.e. the individual thinks they could do better / have no need / are somehow subject to the outcomes of the institution).
pclmulqdq 2y ago
The right's problem with universities is the same as the left's problem with churches: 1. They are institutions of "indoctrination" by the other side. Faculty are something like 98% registered democrats and many subjects ("X studies") have an explicitly left-leaning bent. 2. They have tax advantages and other significant government subsidies. 3. They exercise significant amounts of ideological control over the narrative for their groups of people. 4. They are exclusionary of people outside the club. Add to that the fact that universities are getting increasingly expensive and real life outcomes for college-educated people are getting worse. The perceived costs used to come with significant benefits, but the costs are getting higher and the benefits are reducing, so there is less tolerance for giving them favored status.
- squigz 2y ago
  Maybe I just live in a bubble, but I don't think "the left" has acted as strongly against churches as "the right" has against schools.
  - pclmulqdq 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - ceejayoz 2y ago
      > Universities today, though, have a status that religious organizations have never reached. Not only being tax free but also heavily taxpayer-funded, and with a university credential being virtually required for most jobs. It's almost like they produce something of actual value.
    - squigz 2y ago
      This is a conversation about American politics, so I don't think how other countries acted is relevant. The political landscape also changes regularly - I don't think the Republicans of a few decades ago were attacking schools so vigorously, so I'm not sure going further back than that for examples is relevant either. > efforts of left-wing people in the 60's-90's to reduce their influence on society. Can you elaborate on this? > Universities today, though, have a status that religious organizations have never reached. Not only being tax free but also heavily taxpayer-funded, and with a university credential being virtually required for most jobs. I suspect that if you go back not even that long ago, you'd find religious institutions having nearly as much importance, particularly in how faiths would prevent others from joining the workforce or society itself. In any case, I wonder what % of jobs actually do require a university education these days. I would not expect a majority of them to, but maybe I'm wrong.
wat10000 2y ago
One thing I haven’t seen anyone mention in the replies. There are millions of conservative parents who sent their children to college and then “lost” those children when they turned into a “liberal.” The ideas that it’s ok if your child becomes a liberal, or that there might be good reasons why people who undertake higher education often become less conservative, are too horrible to contemplate. So they settle for “universities are bad.”
vunderba 2y ago
I can't speak to universities specifically, but I've always felt there has been a strain of anti-intellectualism underlying a great deal of mainstream America for as long as I can remember. It's the little things like tv shows or movies with characters who seem to glorify ignorance, people who state self deprecating things like "I'm bad at math" and wear it like a bizarre badge of honor, etc.

pjc50 2y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings was arguably a worse time for universities. Protesting attracts reprisals. Universities taught people, both explicitly and by example, to stand up for what they believed in, but have undersold students on how dangerous that is. Universities could have done a better job explaining that certain injustices are load-bearing, and that calling them out will make half the country hate you.

LatteLazy 2y ago
> certain injustices are load-bearing This is an excellent way of explaining why some injustices are ignored and others decried. Thank you
matthewdgreen 2y ago
People in the 1960s were murdered for protesting. You might imagine that this motivated an end to protest, and everyone calmed down. But in fact, it didn't. The very best way to motivate increased protest is to act like a bunch of monsters.

drooby 2y ago

I think it's actually extremely simple.. because the herd mentality is extremely simple. Intellectuals think it's complex because intellectuals love complexity.. This is what happened.. The right witnessed riots over the past decade. These riots were in response to police brutality and perceived racism. The ideas behind anti-racism spawned a perceived new ideology - "wokism". This frightened the right. Intellectuals on the right mapped the origins of this new ideology to philosophies from elite institutions. Therefore, these institutions must be punished to be kept in check. It's really that simple.. What I find interesting about this guy is that in a way he actually is "caving" to the demands of the administration. This uni president advocates for more heterodox thinking - which is in alignment with what the Trump admin wants as well... maybe that's why Wesleyan won't be punished..

krapp 2y ago
Nothing about this is new - the right has harbored a particular hatred for "academics" and "intellectuals" since at least the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960s. Today's fear of "wokism" is just the prior generation's fear of "cultural marxism" with a new coat of paint. But this kind of political talk is against the guidelines. Good hackers don't care about any of this. So Javascript is getting crazy, huh?
- e40 2y ago
  When the politics get crazy enough it bleeds into everything, which is why it's now acceptable to discuss here.
  - krapp 2y ago
    I think you'll find that no matter how crazy it gets or what it bleeds into, it's never going to be acceptable to discuss here. As soon as people get a whiff of "politics" they're going to start flagging. Especially if they see the "T" word. The regime could be rolling dissidents into mass graves and the only valid point of discussion for most people here would be packing algorithms.
    - andelink 2y ago
      Forgive my ignorance, but what is the "T" word in this context?
      - Smithalicious 2y ago
        Tigger
        selimthegrim 2y ago
        Oh no Pooh, you’re eating liberalism!
      - 2y ago

ty6853 2y ago

Most people don't care about university protests. They're largely a means to get laid while achieving nothing and at worst destroying their own university. As long as they don't spill out into the surrounding town any outrage is essentially theater.

lr4444lr 2y ago

There are some reasons that I think you probably know, which don't receive enough time and attention 1) Despite an appearance of being "left leaning" (according to polls of faculty political sentiment) they continue to gatekeep education behind prohibitively expensive tuition that is out of reach of lower economic strata without crippling debt, and have simultaneously struggled to produce graduates whose economic differential easily makes up for that expense and lost work time. 2) They enjoy a tax free status while receiving significant tax money despite many failing to grow their student bodies in tandem with the growth of the US population, leading to people questioning whether they deserve those benefits as institutions that serve the public. 3) There is a sentiment that basic literacy and numeracy of graduates has dropped over the last decades outside of a narrow area of studies, because of a shift to a model where students are customers buying a credential instead of getting an education. (These are all interrelated, of course.)

insane_dreamer 2y ago
> many failing to grow their student bodies in tandem with the growth of the US population this is mostly true of elite schools (who nowadays are mostly selling a brand more than an education), not so much of state schools
- chrisweekly 2y ago
  Ironically, many elite universities are actually either free or nearly free, for lower-income students. The super-rich probably don't care. While we middle-class families don't qualify for need-based aid, and are on the hook to pay outrageous sums, largely to subsidize the aid for others.
kjkjadksj 2y ago
Lower economic strata doesn't take on debt, they get aid and free rides, cherry work study jobs to put some money in the pocket too. It is the middle class or upper middle class that insists in eschewing their state school benefit for a more or less comparable school in another state (or without favorable scholarship and aid package) that take the brunt of the loans.

_bohm 2y ago

While not about resentment towards universities specifically, I thought this article in The Baffler [1] did a good job of framing a dynamic that, I think, contributes to this phenomenon. My interpretation: As the country has entered the post-industrial era, holding a college degree has increasingly become a table-stakes credential for entering the white collar labor force. The higher education system has struggled or failed to grow to meet increased demand for these credentials, which both drives up the cost and increases selectivity of higher-ed institutions. A lot of people get burned by this and become locked out of and, crucially, geographically separated from labor markets that now constitute the majority of US GDP. This split causes non degree holders to view degree holders as their class enemies, and the universities as the class gateway that divides them. [1] https://thebaffler.com/latest/one-elite-two-elites-red-elite-blue-elite-baker https://thebaffler.com/latest/one-elite-two-elites-red-elite...

keybored 2y ago
Remember all those people who are resentful (of course that word) towards degree-holders because they wish they had one themselves? Me neither. That’s a they-hate-me-cause’-they-ain’t-me kind of logic.[1] True othering comes from people living in different worlds and hating the other person’s world. [1] I did not read the the article but I’ve read this argument in a Graeber article.
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  > because they wish they had one themselves I don't think the OP actually said this specifically. But the economy truly had, for a while, bifurcated in outcomes for people with degrees vs. everybody else. You shouldn't need a degree to live a decent life, but now we are in a timeline where you can put DoorDash on Klarna installments.
- Izikiel43 2y ago
  > Remember all those people who are resentful (of course that word) towards degree-holders because they wish they had one themselves? I think the fair comparison isn't they have a degree and I don't, it's they have a better life/savings/house/car than me, which is enabled in general by getting a degree, which becomes the common contention point.

bell-cot 2y ago

There's a highly emotional Right-Left culture war going on in America. Many of our "flagship" universities conspicuously sided with the Left - at least on most of the "litmus test" issues. And where universities didn't do that, the Right found it advantageous to talk up the association & outrage anyway. Any decent History Prof. could have explained to the U's that openly taking one side in long-term cultural wars was not a viable long-term strategy. (Or, maybe that's why so many universities cut their History Dept's so brutally? Though "just shoot inconvenient messengers" is also not a viable long-term strategy.)

mrtesthah 2y ago
Billionaires shifted the overton window by pouring money into extreme right-wing media outlets and social media platforms. Every other existing institution now appears "left-wing" by comparison. That's not universities' fault.
- lmm 2y ago
  Not true, at least on social issues, which is what the universities are getting burned for. Policy positions that were mainstream in 2000 are now painted as far-right.
  - jhbadger 2y ago
    That's how society progresses though. Before 1865, slavery was mainstream and abolitionists were weird radical crazies. Before 1965, "Jim Crow" laws that said non-whites had to use different bathrooms and drinking fountains were mainstream, and people who opposed them were seen as unreasonable.
    - lmm 2y ago
      And back in the 1960s a planned economy was normal and reasonable, and many progressives openly called for normalisation of sex with teenagers. Sometimes shifts in attitudes are progress. Sometimes they're just a random walk. Sometimes the left is right, sometimes the right is.

disambiguation 2y ago

The political and ideological divide speaks for itself, but on behalf of the common folk universities have been failing their core mission - to provide the people with a quality education. The inversion and disconnect between the cost of tuition and economic outcomes is stunning. Too many kids who don't know better are pressured into pursuing higher education and taking on massive debt, only to graduate without any job prospects or reasonable hopes of paying off their loans. The salt in the wounds is that universities are flush with cash, yet its spent on anything and everything except for the welfare of the students.

harimau777 2y ago
It feels to me like part of the disconnect is that education and job training isn't necessarily the same thing. For many majors improving economic outcomes is not the core mission.
- disambiguation 2y ago
  Its an implicit promise, and we can already see the pendulum swinging back in the form of lower enrollment as more people catch on.
  - lurk2 2y ago
    > Its an implicit promise It's an inferred promise, not an implicit promise. Lots of schools do try to make it an explicit, qualified promise (e.g. "80% of grads work in their field!"), and even more are shifting towards becoming what are effectively vocational schools, but this was never the intended purpose of a liberal arts education.
jwjohnson314 2y ago
> The salt in the wounds is that universities are flush with cash, yet its spent on anything and everything except for the welfare of the students. Maybe the elites. State schools and small colleges are not flush with cash and many have been shuttered or severely downsized recently. Though they could still spend their limited funds better.

dogleash 2y ago

>or is people's ambivalence towards elite universities 100% irrational? am·biv·a·lence /amˈbiv(ə)ləns/ noun the state of having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone. Ambivalence seems like a rational take on post-secondary education in the US. I'd say an unwavering opinion (positive or negative) would be irrational. It's such a complex beast that serves so many roles and touches so many lives. >A lot of Americans support these attacks on universities. Why do people harbour this much animosity towards these institutions? There are a lot of very real things that are rotten in academia if you exclude the social politics center to this article. So when people see they're loosing federal funding... yeah, some will think along the lines of "eh, whatever, fuck 'em, maybe they'll figure out how to clean their own house." Especially if the university is also known for both sitting on a large endowment and for prioritizing self-serving administrators over doing academics.

Gothmog69 2y ago

They could have not been so partisan (https://readlion.com/93-of-college-profs-political-donations-went-to-democrats-last-election-cycle/ https://readlion.com/93-of-college-profs-political-donations... ), supported rational discourse ( https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/2025-college-free-speech-rankings#:~:text=The%20University%20of%20Virginia%20is,second%20year%20in%20a%20row. https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/2025-college-free-spe... ) , not used race to discriminate on certain out groups ( https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discrimination-on-admissions/ https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio... ). Just for starters

fn-mote 2y ago
>> Is there anything they could have done differently in the past decade or two to have broader sympathy now > not used race to discriminate on certain out groups ( https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio https://asianamericanforeducation.org/en/issue/discriminatio... ) Since we have documentation of discrimination in university admissions for over a century, I don't think this particular issue produces "broader sympathy now". In fact, I will be speechless if I ever learn the new administration policies do not lead to even higher levels of, but I suppose different, discrimination. Check back in 6 months.

recursive 2y ago

Provide a way to get a lower-cost credential without using the tuition to subsidize research/athletics/arts/social programs. But that might be counter to their whole nature. Doesn't mean anyone's being irrational though. They're now de-facto gatekeepers on entering the professional class. I don't think it's unreasonable for the gate-kept to have opinions about the -keepers.

treis 2y ago
I've got the ticket to get in the gate and I'm pretty resentful of having to get it. Looking back there were a lot better ways to spend 4 years and 100k.
- joe5150 2y ago
  Resentful of what? Directed at whom? There are lots of options that cost less and many are shorter than four years.
xracy 2y ago
Honestly, it feels like the kind of thing that companies which actually want merit-based graduates should want to subsidize more aggressively. If you're a billion-dollar company that only hires college grads, it feels like there's gotta be value to you in making sure there's more meritocracy in the process of getting degrees. It would also change who the customer is so that the university doesn't "owe" the student a degree which makes the evaluation that universities do a little less rigorous.
- eszed 2y ago
  Why do they want meritocracy? The companies I've seen up close want "certified Smart Kid", in which case nearly any degree will do; "pre-trained worker", in which case they require a degree in a particular field; or "someone well-connected", in which case they want someone from a limited set of schools. (Companies do subsidize that limited set of schools, and pretty heavily, but it probably has more to do with social connections than economic merit.) The system might break down to the point that what you're suggesting makes sense. On the other hand, "Indebted Worker" (from any of the three types above) allows companies a lot of power over their employees, so it might not.

guywithahat 2y ago

> attacks on universities This really feels like bad phrasing, when people read that they roll their eyes. Basically every major republican politician went to college, nobody is attacking universities, they're trying to help the students.

watwut 2y ago
Yes they went to universities. No, they are not trying to help the students. They don't even pretend to be trying to do so. They are nit trying to make it cheaper and they are not trying to make it more accessible. They agenda was either openly the opposite or they ignored the students. Except when they think they are too progressive and attack then verbally.
- guywithahat 2y ago
  I mean, at a minimum, they think they're helping students. Nobody would vote for a politician who just makes things worse, that doesn't make sense. In this case, they're trying to make universities more fair and to reduce government waste in universities by removing DEI programs. There's lots of logic to that.
  - Izikiel43 2y ago
    >Nobody would vote for a politician who just makes things worse Why not? One thing is the campaign, another one is exercising his power. To quote a famous Argentinian President: "If I said what I would do, they wouldn't have voted for me".
    - guywithahat 2y ago
      I can't find the source of that quote (possibly a misquote?), but if I had to guess, he's saying he sold people on the problem, knowing they wouldn't like the solution. Everyone likes the idea of fixing the budget deficit, and some people like the idea of cutting wasteful government spending, but the act of fixing the budget means people lose jobs, and lives are destroyed. Even though it has to happen, people don't like watching it happen. I don't think your "quote" says what you think it says.

chrisweekly 2y ago

I think there's class warfare practically baked in with how paying for college works today. Imagine trying to determine how much a fancy car costs, and being told "it depends on how much money you have". That's on the upper-middle-class side. The other side is just part of the worldview of the rampant anti-intellectualism which Trump rode to power.

taeric 2y ago

Hard not to see this as a class war that has been fed by some of the personalities that were big in the "conservative" sphere for a long time. Modern podcast influencers are big, but this isn't exactly a new thing. Rush and his ilk were big on lashing out against "ivory tower" theories. And they didn't invent the idea. Just went after easy targets. None of which is to say that mistakes weren't made in the institutions. They were. Mistakes were also made by the critics. Populism, sadly, has a habit of celebrating their worst and elevating them to heights they flat out can't handle.

2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago

Fox News. I don't think it's 100% irrational but perhaps 99% irrational. These ideas usually contain a nugget of truth.

rayiner 2y ago

It was the progressive push of theoretically neutral institutions taking stands on moral politics. People who were fine with universities being staffed with liberals, but neutral in practice, realized their tax dollars were subsidizing institutions that were actively taking a side in national politics. For example, universities burned a lot of political capital, and opened themselves up to a great deal of legal liability, with aggressively pursing affirmative action policies. When you depend on public grants, it’s probably a bad idea to publicly discriminate against the racial group that comprises the majority of taxpayers. As to what universities should have done, the answer is “just dribble.” Universities should be places that are just as eager to research effective approaches to mass deportations as all the DEI stuff they do.

archagon 2y ago
Sure, and why not open an Institute of Enhanced Interrogation Studies while you’re at it? Ugh.
- milesrout 2y ago
  Because torturing people is illegal and contrary to our fundamental values, while deporting illegal immigrants is a very popular and sensible policy that is uncontroversial everywhere except the United States of Exceptionalism.
  - archagon 2y ago
    Torturing people was considered very cool and very legal until quite recently. Some of the leaders involved in Iraq and Afghanistan era torture are still in positions of power. And I would not be shocked in the slightest if it came back under Trump II.
hausrat 2y ago
[flagged]
- milesrout 2y ago

WalterBright 2y ago

They could try hiring some conservative professors. https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/31/2/homogenous_the_political_affiliations_of_elite_liberal_arts_college_faculty https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/31/2/homogenous_the_p...

zdragnar 2y ago
You can't really just hire some, though. You need to hire enough so that they don't get run out of the school for thought crime https://www.thedoe.com/article/conservative-college-professor-makes-me-toxic https://www.thedoe.com/article/conservative-college-professo...
- xracy 2y ago
  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/id1651876897?i=1000603422829 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-am... A lot of these examples have been pretty thoroughly debunked as either non-existent, or about something other than the professors expressing "conservative views". This one is, I assume intentionally, anonymized and so we can't actually verify that it happened or what the circumstances around it were. But I'll call out one of the most common "views" I've heard on college campuses from professors that got in trouble for something was that "professors should be allowed to sleep with their students." So if professors are taking heat for thinking that they should be able to take advantage of barely legal kids... I don't really care. If there are legitimate examples of professors just expressing that they have conservative beliefs, then that is suspicious because school administrators and alumni tend to lean pretty conservative themselves, and often make the final decisions on such issues after a frustrating amount of investigation.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]

karaterobot 2y ago

You're framing this in an odd way if you want neutral responses. Is withdrawing federal funding an attack? The government has always used the power of the purse as a lever to influence many institutions, including universities, and it often uses this mechanism to exert influence for ideological purposes. The most famous example is withholding funding for roads until states mandated a drinking age of 21. It's how the federal-state power asymmetry works. The disturbing thing is that Congress isn't really the one exerting it in this case, not that it's being used at all.

lr4444lr 2y ago
As for the roads example, which would go to my second point if I understand you correctly, I think the analogy is limited: roads aren't gate-kept by admissions committees for certain intangible criteria for who can ride on them, with an artificial limit on how many cars overall, while they receive federal funding. If that was happening, then you'd have a similar situation to what universities are doing.
- karaterobot 2y ago
  It's not meant as an analogy for this case, so don't worry about it too much. My only point in bringing it up is an example of evidence for prior governments being more than willing to use funding as a lever to influence the policy of institutions they are not directly responsible for. I don't believe it was to be 1:1 to make that point, as indeed it is not.

deleted 2y ago

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energy123 2y ago

It's about reclaiming lost social status. In their minds it's part of the liberal gollum that makes them feel alienated from society and disrespected.

tastyface 2y ago

Why did the Germans burn books? Look there for your answers. And I mean that sincerely. There’s really nothing new under the sun.

ytpete 2y ago
Or the Cultural Revolution.

Sloowms 2y ago

Wait, there are attacks on universities? Or are we just using that word for any expression of free speech?

sequoia 2y ago
I'm referring to threats to pull hundreds of thousands of dollars of funding if certain demands aren't met. But yes, there are also plenty of rhetorical attacks.
- xvokcarts 2y ago
  Isn't that how funding works? We give you money, you meet demands. How is that an attack?
  - sequoia 1y ago
    Yeah fair enough. I agree Trump was elected democratically and he's acting on behalf of "the people" when he threatens to pull funding. Perhaps attack was the wrong word.

tomrod 2y ago

From what I've been able to gather, a mix of jealousy for not being involved with institutions along with some form of Dunning Kruger effect thinking that the institutions have no merit or value (i.e. the individual thinks they could do better / have no need / are somehow subject to the outcomes of the institution).

pclmulqdq 2y ago

The right's problem with universities is the same as the left's problem with churches: 1. They are institutions of "indoctrination" by the other side. Faculty are something like 98% registered democrats and many subjects ("X studies") have an explicitly left-leaning bent. 2. They have tax advantages and other significant government subsidies. 3. They exercise significant amounts of ideological control over the narrative for their groups of people. 4. They are exclusionary of people outside the club. Add to that the fact that universities are getting increasingly expensive and real life outcomes for college-educated people are getting worse. The perceived costs used to come with significant benefits, but the costs are getting higher and the benefits are reducing, so there is less tolerance for giving them favored status.

squigz 2y ago
Maybe I just live in a bubble, but I don't think "the left" has acted as strongly against churches as "the right" has against schools.
- pclmulqdq 2y ago
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  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    > Universities today, though, have a status that religious organizations have never reached. Not only being tax free but also heavily taxpayer-funded, and with a university credential being virtually required for most jobs. It's almost like they produce something of actual value.
  - squigz 2y ago
    This is a conversation about American politics, so I don't think how other countries acted is relevant. The political landscape also changes regularly - I don't think the Republicans of a few decades ago were attacking schools so vigorously, so I'm not sure going further back than that for examples is relevant either. > efforts of left-wing people in the 60's-90's to reduce their influence on society. Can you elaborate on this? > Universities today, though, have a status that religious organizations have never reached. Not only being tax free but also heavily taxpayer-funded, and with a university credential being virtually required for most jobs. I suspect that if you go back not even that long ago, you'd find religious institutions having nearly as much importance, particularly in how faiths would prevent others from joining the workforce or society itself. In any case, I wonder what % of jobs actually do require a university education these days. I would not expect a majority of them to, but maybe I'm wrong.

wat10000 2y ago

One thing I haven’t seen anyone mention in the replies. There are millions of conservative parents who sent their children to college and then “lost” those children when they turned into a “liberal.” The ideas that it’s ok if your child becomes a liberal, or that there might be good reasons why people who undertake higher education often become less conservative, are too horrible to contemplate. So they settle for “universities are bad.”

vunderba 2y ago

I can't speak to universities specifically, but I've always felt there has been a strain of anti-intellectualism underlying a great deal of mainstream America for as long as I can remember. It's the little things like tv shows or movies with characters who seem to glorify ignorance, people who state self deprecating things like "I'm bad at math" and wear it like a bizarre badge of honor, etc.